BENNINGTON P.I.
The Collection
By D.W. Ulsterman
2014
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A note from the author:
Hello again, reader and congratulations on your purchase of the Bennington P.I. Collection! It is by far the lowest cost option to explore the interesting, sometimes sordid, and hopefully entertaining (to you) world of Frank Bennington.
Please note that this collection begins with the title, The Second Oldest Profession a story that is an introduction to the character of Bennington. It shows a man (barely) living in the moral morass that is Washington D.C., and as such, does have some scenes of an adult nature. These scenes are not meant to merely shock the reader, but rather to provide a point of comparison as Frank Bennington’s character develops in the proceeding stories.
In the first book, Bennington is not necessarily a bad man, but certainly a deeply flawed one. By the fourth installment Frank comes to realize just how much more there is to himself - that his own true purpose in whatever remains of his own life is far greater than the mere sum of its parts.
In that sense, it’s a search for meaning many of us can relate to – myself included.
Happy Reading,
-D.W. Ulsterman
Reader reaction to the character of Frank Bennington:
“Loved it!!! Bennington would make a great movie or TV show character. He's just "cool" in that old school kind of way.” -sbouch11
“Fast paced and engrossing read.” -M. Thompson/Vine Voice
“DW Ulsterman has a hit on his hands in Bennington P.I.” – Marlowe
“DW Ulsterman has the fresh enthusiasm of a new writer and yet the story development of an old experienced hand at his craft.” -Stephanie Hagy
“5 STARS – EXCELLENT COLLECTION! Very entertaining read.” -Terry
“Outstanding story! I have read a lot of mystery stories and this was one of the best!” -Kat T.
THE SECOND
OLDEST PROFESSION
(Bennington #1)
BY D.W. ULSTERMAN
2013
A politician is an endlessly corruptive and corrupted creature. From a distance they seem harmless enough, but up close, there’s a terrifying aspect to their nature that always left me stunned over how little they actually knew, while at the same time, they were so convinced of always deserving more.
-The Old Man
1.
Washington D.C. was nothing like Colin O’Shea expected it to be. Outside of the Capitol Hill neighborhood, with its national parks, legislative buildings, naval yard, and upscale office and shopping districts in and around Pennsylvania Avenue, the city was a disgusting mess of drug addicts, prostitution, and violent crime. The emergency sirens were never silent in and around D.C., their shrill droning an ever present cry for help from a city gone mad – a city lost in its own penchant for excess and corruption, madness and mayhem.
In March, it became his new home.
Three months earlier, he received an email asking if he would be interested in working with Congressmen Joseph Latner’s team. Latner had been Colin’s congressman almost his entire life of twenty-four years. As a college student he had been a lead volunteer during the congressman’s most recent re-election campaign two years earlier, having organized a very effective get out the vote operation on the massive Ohio State University campus. The operation was so effective in fact, it garnered the attention of Congressman Latner’s chief of staff and campaign manager, the legendary Frank Bennington. Like the congressman, Frank Bennington had been a long time fixture inside the ever moving and re-positioning, “you’re only as good as your last election” machine that was D.C. politics. It was Bennington who had called Colin personally shortly after midnight on a Thursday to ask if he had gotten his email, and if he wanted to join the congressman’s staff in Washington D.C.
“Hey kid, loved what you did at the campus there last election. Heard great things about you. How about after you graduate, you come work for me and the congressman? That grab you by the balls and put a tickle in your ass? The pay is shit, the hours long, but you’ll be rubbing elbows with the big boys, namely, yours truly. I’m old enough now that I need a real deal protégé, and I think you just might be it.”
Colin’s reply was both stunned and immediate. He said yes of course.
Three months later, there he was, sitting on the corner of a double bed inside of a Hotel 6 four miles from the Capitol building in Washington D.C. the night before he was to make his first journey to the Hill. He couldn’t sleep. His mind wouldn’t shut off. He was going to meet Frank friggin’ Bennington in person. The guy had worked in the White House for crying out loud. The big show. The Oval. Sure it was over thirty years ago, but for Colin O’Shea, that didn’t matter. He had read every word of Bennington’s two books on politics, watched from the back row of an auditorium during a speaking engagement he gave when Colin was a freshman at Ohio State, and now the guy was going to be his boss.
At the time, he truly believed life couldn’t be any better. He was a naïve little shit. If only he had simply hit delete after that initial email. Then again, if he had done that, he never would have met Kat.
The next morning Colin awoke after no more than a few hours of restless sleep, and, per Bennington’s instructions, had a cab drop him off at Union Station. He was told parking was nearly impossible for low level staffers, so Union Station would be his starting point each day. The walk from there to the Capitol Building took no more than twenty minutes. Colin had his congressional staff credentials clipped to the front of a navy blue blazer that had been his father’s. Underneath that was a white Costco dress shirt and solid colored red tie that was also a has-been from his dad’s wardrobe. Cream colored khaki pants and a pair of rather sad, scuffed, dark brown dress shoes completed the first day ensemble.
Union Station on a weekday was incredibly busy as other staffers moved about on their way to the Hill. Most were better dressed than the recent graduate, more aggressive, their eyes focused on their touch screens, sending and receiving a myriad of texts as they made their way down the sidewalk toward the congressional office buildings in the cool March-morning air of Washington D.C. Spring was soon to arrive, and the poetic part of Colin thought to place himself in the concept of new beginnings and all that. Young, talented, idealistic politico enters the power center of the Western World to do good and make his mark.
Naïve little shit indeed.
Once at the Capitol building, he passed through the same entrance as the guided public tours took, but instead of going through that public security check point, staffers can turn left down a short hallway and then enter the credentialed security check. Senior staff and members of Congress most often parked in the massive underground garage directly below the legislative buildings, passing to and from the halls of power, rarely seen by the “regular folk”. The more recent members of Congress and their staff fought over what was left – a first come first serve parking permit system used as political leverage by whatever party controlled the House and Senate at that time.
At the time of Colin’s arrival that day, Congressman Latner was a senior member of the House of Representatives, serving his twenty-fifth year there. Getting a good parking space had not been an issue for the Ohio congressman for some time. That meant as the congressman’s chief of staff, Frank Bennington also enjoyed the parking perks of political seniority.
One cannot really overemphasize the importance of parking at the Capitol. It is on ongoing power play between all the members of Congress and their staff – a sign one’s position is respected, and more importantly, feared. If you didn’t have good parking, that was a sure sign you were considered a political throw-away, and those people were always looking over their shoulders for fear of losing their next election.
Even more important than the parking, was your assigned legislative office space. Junior members of congress were pushed into the smaller offices at the far ends of the respective House and Senate buildings that bookended the Rotunda. The more important the congressperson or senator, the better the office. Again, a quarter century spent in Washington D.C. afforded Congressman Latner a very nice office, just four doors down from the Speaker’s office, which many say puts even the Oval Office to shame.
Once past the credentialed security check, you’re into the actual hallways, or what Bennington called “the large intestine” of the United States Congress.
“Congress is one big, never-ending bowel movement, and every one of us in here are all just chunks of shit slowly moving out the other end.”
Frank Bennington had a knack for putting things into perspective.
Lots of people say the phrase “corridors of power”. Well, there are few places in the world where those words are more appropriate than the halls of the United States Congress. Try as you might, you can’t keep your footsteps from making noise in there, and you not only hear the sounds of hard heeled shoes all around you hitting the marble floors, but also the echoes of hundreds of years of American history.
As you near the legislative offices, regardless of what floor of those offices you are on, you’ll note various pieces of furniture placed outside the hallways, leather couches and chairs, rows of file cabinets, even desks move in and out of the actual rooms of the capitol in a seemingly never ending design parade. This drove Congressman Latner crazy. He had not changed a piece of furniture in his office for well over a decade, and he thought the furnishings strewn about in the outside hallways to be disrespectful of the building’s history.
“These kids today are a bunch of messy little shit-rags.”
The congressman loved that term “shit-rag.” Nobody knew why, but he apparently said it a lot.
Entering Congressman Latner’s office was just like any other office – you turned the door handle and pushed. Inside was a small, well furnished reception area where sat the remarkably professional and near-ageless Christina Taylor. She had worked reception for Congressman Latner since his arrival in Washington D.C. a quarter century ago. It took Colin weeks to find out her actual age – Bennington finally disclosed it to him after his third double-scotch at his favorite haunt, the Off the Record bar in the basement of the Hay-Adams Hotel, across the street from Lafayette Park and the White House, and just a block away from the massive, white pillared Treasury Building.
Christina Taylor was fifty-seven years old. She could easily have passed for a woman a decade younger. Her dyed blonde hair was cut short, framing a high cheek-boned face, large blue eyes, a slightly too long nose, and somewhat thin lips. Colin would find that each day, no matter how early he attempted to get to work, Christina was always the first into Congressman Latner’s office, and often the last to leave. She was the face of that little hub of legislative activity, greeting visitors with an icy, imposing stare, filtering out those who were worthy of a meeting, and gently pushing out those who were not.
The new hire liked her from the moment he arrived on that first day.
As he entered the office, Christina looked up from behind a simple oak desk whose surface only contained a small laptop, and a dark brown, leather bound sign-in folder, and pen.
“Hello – do you have an appointment?”
Her voice was all business – direct, authoritative, though remaining cordial.
Colin cleared his throat and made certain to look her in the eye. Bennington had made that point clear to him during their last phone conversation.
“Make sure you don’t shit on the floor when you walk in. Look Christina in the eye and earn her respect. If she doesn’t like you the Congressman won’t like you, and your time with us will last as long as it takes for her to tell him to get rid of you.”
Recalling that warning, Colin cleared his throat again.
“Hi, I’m Colin, Colin O’Shea. I’m supposed to start working with Mr. Bennington today.”
Christina Taylor stood up, her height, assisted by three inch heels, almost equal to Colin’s own six feet. She wore a matching dark grey skirt and dress jacket, accompanied by a cream colored blouse.
“Oh – you’re Frank’s new project! The young man who did such good work at Ohio State for the Congressman, is that right?”
Colin nodded his head, feeling just slightly more at ease.
“Yes, I was told to make sure I was here no later than 8:00 a.m. I’m a few minutes early, so I’m happy to wait…”
Christina smiled as she shook her head.
“Frank told you to get here by 8:00, huh? I don’t think I’ve seen him drag his carcass in here that early for a very long time. Ok then, how about a quick tour of the offices, and then you can wait for Frank to show up. You might be waiting a while though.”
The reception room was no more than a twelve by twelve space, its walls a darkly stained wood that matched the desk behind which Christina sat. Two leather bound chairs and a somewhat out of place, oriental themed coffee table sat on the right side of the small room. A single, closed door was located opposite the reception room entrance. It was that door that Christina moved toward and opened as she motioned for me to follow behind her.
Past the doorway was a short, narrow hallway with a door immediately to the left, another door a few steps down to the right, and then two more doors opposite each other at the very end of the hallway.
Christina stopped at the first door on the left and opened it up.
“Well, come on in. This is where you’ll be spending most of your time, Mr. O’Shea.”
The room was small, and incredibly cramped. Three small desks were lined up against the walls, each with a small, metallic framed chair behind them. Each desk also had outdated looking computer monitors, stacks of files, and an assortment of pens and pencils. Where no desks sat, there were rows of file cabinets, boxes of print paper, an older combination copy and fax machine, and overhead, hanging from the nine foot ceiling, a single light bulb that offered a soft glow throughout the otherwise dark, chaotic, and windowless space.
“You will be sharing this space with Jolene and Tracy. The third desk used to be Mark’s, but he took another position with Senator Roberts. That’s why you’re here, to fill Mark’s position. Jolene and Tracy do all the legislative review work for the Congressman - write out his talking points and basically tell him what to say and why he’s saying it.”
Colin’s hazel green eyes wandered from each cluttered corner to the other, as he attempted to hide his disappointment at the messy chaos.
“Maybe you can convince Jolene and Tracy to clean this place up?”
Colin glanced over at Christina and offered a thin smile.
“Yeah, maybe.”
He then followed Christina down the short hallway to the first door on the right. She opened it to reveal a nicely furnished meeting area, though it was no larger than the first room. A long, wood conference table ran nearly the length of the entire room, surrounded by matching wood chairs. Both chairs and table appeared to be quite old. Several examples of framed artwork covered the walls, as well as two floor lamps that stood in each of the four corners.
“This is where we sit down with constituents, lobbyists, or whoever else the congressman doesn’t wish to meet with in his personal office. You’re not to use this room as a work space without the approval of the congressman. Please remember that or he will go ballistic. He’s very much into appearances, and that table set was used by Ohio Congressman Benj
amin Wade in the 1850’s in this very office all those years ago.”
Colin nodded and waited to be led to the next rooms down the hallway.
Christina stopped short of opening the next door on the right, simply pointing toward it.
“That is Frank’s office – Mr. Bennington. He’ll probably call you in there when he arrives later today. He may not be in until after lunch.”
Colin looked over at the door opposite Frank Bennington’s.
“So that’s the Congressman’s office? Will he be here today?”
Christina shook her head.
“Oh no – his normal schedule has him coming in on Wednesdays from 11:00 to 1:00. You and Jolene and Tracy are responsible for getting Frank his summary report which he then shares with the Congressman. I in turn coordinate with Frank to map out the Congressman’s schedule for the following week.”
Private Detective: BENNINGTON P.I.: A thrilling four-novel political murder mystery private detective series... Page 1
